Thread

NRC issues first U.S. construction permit for a BWRX-300 small modular reactor

151 points · 191 comments · papa-whisky

preisschild · 1790751984 · focus · HN ↗
The BWRX-300 footprint is so large they might as well just build large nuclear power units again and get 3-4x the power
1. nine_k · 1790754444 · focus · HN ↗
  I don't think that the footprint is the key factor. Likely the total construction cost is. A large reactor may have a better cost per kWh, averaged over decades of its lifetime, but a smaller reactor likely has a more affordable upfront cost.
  1. jillesvangurp · 1790762848 · focus · HN ↗
    The key point with small modular reactors vs. reactors like this is that construction happens in factories rather than on site. Theoretically, you might get some economies of scale from series production in a factory that is much harder to get doing bespoke construction projects. Which is why historically, nuclear projects tend to blow through their cost estimates and why having larger reactors makes that a bit more tolerable. Of course until somebody actually does this and scales to hundreds/thousands of reactors production, this is all theoretical.
    This particular reactor is already estimated at over 5 billion $ I think. That's a lot of money for just 300MW and it probably could end up being a wildly optimistic estimate as well. I think effectively much of the construction is still on site and not in a factory. Hence the need for a construction permit. So, you get all of the downsides of complex on site construction such as including high cost, permitting overhead, lots of bureaucracy, associated delays & uncertainty, etc. without the upside of actually delivering a lot of power like you would with a larger reaction. Calling it "modular" might be overstating things a bit.
    Probably cheaper, faster, and easier to just plonk down 5GW of solar, wind, or battery (or combinations of those). Especially if you calculate in the 200-300% time and dollar budget that many nuclear projects seem to end up having. Maybe this one will be different. A lot of people have a lot riding on Nuclear projects breaking this trend. But then that has been the case for decades.
    xvilka · 1790773131 · focus · HN ↗
    In China you get the economy of scale for building nuclear power plants precisely because they are standardized. Thus, pivoting to SMR is unnecessary, since they produce significantly less energy.
    throwaway2037 · 1790812930 · focus · HN ↗
    > In China you get the economy of scale for building nuclear power plants precisely because they are standardized.
    Is this really true? Or how can we know it is true? For example: Why is the reason not explained by incredibly cheap construction labor costs compared to other rich countries?
    Related: UAE had zero nuclear power plants before the Barakah nuclear power plant[1] opened starting in 2020. They built 4x Korean APR-1400s for only 32B USD. That seems incredibly cheap. How did they do it? I assume (near) slave labour prices for construction workers, like most other stuff built in that country.
    [1] <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barakah_nuclear_power_plant" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barakah_nuclear_power_plant
    chermi · 1790877368 · focus · HN ↗
    Last I checked labor was 15-30% for such projects, so it could help but only so much
    throwaway2037 · 1791128999 · focus · HN ↗
    Again, I asked ChatGPT for some sources for your post, but I couldn't find any reliable sources. Can you provide a reliable source for your claim?

Open on Hacker News to reply ↗

Unofficial Hacker News client; not affiliated with Y Combinator.